Composites lamination systems are used to manufacture aircraft and aerospace components, wind turbine components, and other articles where high strength and light weight are primary objectives. Composite contour tape layer (CTL) grade tape and fiber towpreg are both widely used; each system has its advantages and limitations.
A fiber placement head provides independent control over material feed via the clamp, cut and re-start mechanism for up to 16 individual tows of composite prepreg slit tape (towpreg), allowing automated “on-the-fly” adjustment of the fiber band width, controlled placement of fibers around changing contours, and precise configuration of openings. The fiber placement head allows wrinkle-free, near-net-shape lay-up of enclosed and deeply contoured structures and concave/convex surfaces. The fiber placement head is ideal for precision production of fuselage sections, outer mold line and inner mold line panels, cowls, ducts and nozzle cones for commercial, military and space vehicles, including parts that make use of lightweight honeycomb core materials.
A tape laying head deposits carbon/epoxy CTL grade tape at speeds up to 60 m/min (2400 inches per minute) using 75, 150 or 300 mm (3, 6 or 12 in) carbon/epoxy tape at any orientation and number of plies, ensuring consistent quality, part shape, thickness and strength.
The same application head cannot be used to lay up both tape and fiber towpreg, and as a result, laying up CTL grade tape and then switching to fiber towpreg requires moving the article being laid up from a first machine to a second machine. Because the article being laid up is usually large, relocating a half laid up article from a tape laying machine to a fiber placement machine or vice-versa is a cumbersome, time consuming task and reduces accuracy of ply-to-ply placement.
Certain prior art systems with removable and interchangeable heads have one or more major machine axes that stay with the head and dock away from the machine when the heads are switched due to their concept configuration or the legacy design from which they are derived. This makes the cost of each individual head more expensive since duplicate axis hardware is built into each head. Other head designs incorporate an integral wrist and creel that stays with the head and detaches from the remainder of the machine when one head is swapped for another, thus adding even more cost for the redundant mechanism that is designed into a multi-head system.